Wanted: Used Christmas trees for wildlife

A man trims the bottom of a Christmas tree in Halifax earlier this month. The Hope for Wildlife animal hospital in Seaforth is looking for used Christmas trees to give the animals a happier time in rehab. (ADRIEN VECZAN / Staff)

Time is up for the Christmas trees of 2011, those martyrs of the forest: after growing for years, they were cut down to give a family a week or two of pleasure. Soon they will be stripped and set out by the curb.

Unless, that is, their families decide to give them the rare chance at a second life. The Hope for Wildlife animal hospital in Seaforth is looking for used Christmas trees to give the animals a happier time in rehab.

“Some of our (outdoor bird cages) are actually quite big, so we could actually put the whole tree in the unit, and some of the birds would naturally fly to the tree and perch in it,” said Hope Swinimer, director of the Hope for Wildlife Society.

“It would give them shelter and protection.”

Swinimer has gotten to know thousands of animals since taking in her first injured robin in 1995. The rehabilitation centre now takes in more than 1,500 injured or orphaned wild animals and birds every year from across the province. Dozens of volunteers help nurse them back to health, moving them outside into more natural-seeming enclosed spaces as they recover.

Aside from the birds, whose wire “flight units” could be laced with the boughs from Christmas trees, Hope for Wildlife has a number of porcupines right now who could use some greenery in their cages, Swinimer said.

It makes the prickly patients feel “a little bit safer, a little bit more comfortable, a little more natural,” she said.

Trees can be dropped off at 5909 Highway 207, left at the end of the driveway any time of day on any day except Sunday. They must be completely stripped of any decorations, since even the tiniest shred of tinsel could harm some animals, and they must be free of any contaminants or commercial products such as artificial snow.

Aside from making a temporary home in the recycled trees, some animals eat them. For white-tailed deer, who go through branches quickly as meals, other kinds of greenery are also welcome, including maple.

Hope for Wildlife has space for at least 70 Christmas trees to live out their retirements in the company of other homesick forest-dwellers, Swinimer said.

“You know, we find they last a lot longer than you’d think,” she said. “It’ll get us through almost until early spring, at least until the end of February, and we don’t like to go chop down trees to make the cages beautiful.”